Woman Killed Alongside Her Great-Grandchildren in California Wildfire
The death toll from the growing blaze has reached 5, authorities said Saturday.
A great-grandmother and her two beloved great-grandchildren are the latest to be named among victims of the wildfire ripping through a vast expanse of Northern California.
Melody Bledsoe, 70, had been listed as unaccounted for since Thursday along with her great-grandchildren James Roberts, 5, and Emily Roberts, 4.
On Saturday, Bledsoe's husband had the sad duty of identifying the remains.
“I’m just devastated,” Eddy Bledsoe told the Redding Record Searchlight. "All she lived for were them kids and me."
Bledsoe had been holding out hope since the Carr fire overtook their home on the outskirts of Redding when he briefly left to go to the store.
Bledsoe said he didn't believe the fire could jump the nearby Sacramento River. "Within 15 minutes, it burned my house down," he recalled.
Two firefighters have also been killed in the blaze. They've been identified as bulldozer operator Don Ray Smith, of Pollock Pines and Redding fire Inspector Jeremy Stoke.
The AP reported Saturday that an estimated 38,000 people were under evacuation orders with 5,000 homes threatened and the fire only 5 percent contained.
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